


Research Assistant

by NorroenDyrd



Series: Should Never Have Existed [15]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Developing Friendships, Dialogue Heavy, F/M, Flowers, Gen, Language of Flowers, Magic, Sweet Merrill (Dragon Age), Tevinter Inquisitor, Unresolved Romantic Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-26
Updated: 2018-08-26
Packaged: 2019-07-02 19:09:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15802755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NorroenDyrd/pseuds/NorroenDyrd
Summary: In an alternative universe where Alexius actually succeeds in removing the Herald, time goes a bit awry: the Herald that he was targeting has survived, albeit now without the Mark... Because it has gone to him. Branded by the light of the Fade and cut off from the original timeline, Alexius has no choice but to just 'roll with it', as Varric would probably say. He has now completed quite a substantial stretch of the Inquisitor's path, cautiously befriended some of the Inner Circle (including Cassandra, whom he might be developing a crush on), and, with Felix still alive, dedicated his free time to perfecting some of the powders and potions he has been treating him with. In this pursuit, the input of Merrill - who tagged along with her beloved Hawke - proves invaluable. And not just because of her expertise on cleansing the Blight.





	Research Assistant

She would not stay put in Kirkwall. Entrusting the local elves into the hands of her most devoted helpers (nervous, huge-eyed People of the alienage, who had come to call her Keeper, with a lot of flushing and awkward stuttering always ensuring on both sides whenever she heard them say that), she said her goodbyes, and rushed to her tiny home to get ready, bare-sole footfalls soft on the dusty unpaved streets.  
  
It was one of her two homes, actually, the second being that grand mansion in Hightown; but the latter felt so horribly empty with everyone gone, so she had moved back when the elves asked for her help with staying safe as the rest of the city drowned in fire and screams.  
  
One she got there, losing her way but once, she snatched up her staff, wrapped in colourful ribbons and chattering with tiny ornamental trinkets. Pebbles and sloppily painted sticks, mostly - but the city da'len, awestruck by the sight of a ‘weal Keepaf’, all open mouths and batting lashes and grimy little fingers fiddling with frizzled braids and fraying sleeves, thought that they would bring her good luck, and the word of da'len is law. And they made her staff look so pretty too!  
  
Her pretty, pretty staff in hand, she smiled in farewell at the barren walls and the rickety table (always with a pitcher of water to offer her guests!), and took to the road, and walked and walked and walked (and occasionally sailed too) until she caught up with Hawke on his way to Skyhold.  
  
And now she won’t stay put at Skyhold either. The Inquisitor’s research begins to beckon her the moment she learns about it from Bethany (another member of the Hawke family who would not stay put, restless even as her brother entrusted her in the care of a very important, and very beautiful, Orlesian mage). So she starts paying frequent visits to the smoke- and hiss- filled laboratory that the Inquisitor has set up on the wooden platform overlooking his quarters.  
  
He teleports go the top, of course (you won’t catch a mage of his age and upbringing puffing his way up and down wibbly-wobbly ladders), but she climbs up the mundane way, swift and flexible and oh so excited to help the Inquisitor, and his apprentice, and his son, and anyone else who comes and goes, a multitude of rushing greenish silhouettes behind the veil of potion fumes.  
  
She who once cleansed a tainted artefact, her little red-nailed hand firm and tireless, even as the world around her closed in, dark and stifling and with no hope but the kind light in Hawke’s eyes, is now more than ready to have a go at perfecting a potion to ease the symptoms of the Blight. All on her own. Without relying on the whispers of spirits that grow gnarly spikes and seep, infection-like, into the flesh of your loved ones when you are not looking.  
  
She is not… invited to the lab, per she. She just shows up, like the kitten her pirate friend compares her to, and then stays. And the Inquisitor does not frown upon her presence - though he does grow tense when he spots the dark fine lines of vallaslin curling along her cheekbones. A Dalish elf - an actual Dalish elf, the freest of the free… And he, a former magister, blood and bone of the land where her kin is kept as slaves. Looking at those spiky tattooed vines, imprinted deep into her face, he feels the same heavy guilt press down at the edge of his consciousness, grinding his poor brain matter like a crushing mill stone, as when he catches glimpses of the fleshy mess that half of young Trevelyan’s face turned into as she emerged out of the Fade by his side… Robbed of her Mark, her destiny, by the man who had screamed into her face that she should never have existed.  
  
Trevelyan does not remember that, not in this timeline; nor does the eager, ever-smiling Dalish appear to mind the company of so many Tevinters. Probably because they are Varric-approved, going down in his stories not under the pretentious, foreign names that are probably entered in overly complex cursive in the latest issue of the Liberalum - but as Archie. Sparkler. Tulip. All friends in this new, bizarre reality. All fighting for a common cause.  
  
It is not long before she is first heard responding to one of Dorian’s off-hand jests about Hawke with ‘I am sorry, was that something dirty? Dirty things go over my head’, and he bursts into a short but genuine laugh and says,  
  
'Oh, my dearest Merrill, I would never say dirty things about your husband. A great man like him deserves only the most elaborate, poetic praise… Unless you disapprove, of course’.  
  
To which she beams,  
  
'Oh, it’s quite all right. The world is full of beautiful people, and they did not stop being beautiful after ma'vhenan and I fell in love. We like talking to one another about how gorgeous everyone is, and it’s lovely that someone should think the same about us!’  
  
And before they know it, the whole room is laughing, and the Inquisitor breathes a little easier.  
  
With ease of breath, comes an expectant turn of his head when she runs late (for which she is not to blame: Skyhold ought to be almost the size of Kirkwall, with even more unexpected turns and staircases that lead Maker knows where; the only person who never gets lost here is probably Solas, and he must be getting navigation hints from local spirits). And then, a smile of recognition when she does make it to today’s experiment session, arms full of such enormous bundles of brownish tomes that she looks as if she had been gathering firewood in the wilderness.  
  
And some books - Maker forgive him - might as well be firewood. Even if picked from the healing lore section of the library, they contain nothing but folk superstition that Tevinter researchers have long since disproved. And this time, there is a… needlessly thick, generously illustrated volume on… Flower language?  
  
'Well, this is going to be of little use,’ the Inquisitor declares, after flipping through the lists of flowers and their meanings with a judgemental squint and settinghandwriting'Unless someone wants a laugh. Oh, this tome looks promising, however; thank you, Merrill!’  
  
He switches to poring over the much more informative diagrams in a different book - but Merrill picks up the discarded flower language catalogue again and says solemnly,  
  
'Healing arts are important - but what if… What if you decide to send someone a secret message? Like my friend Aveline did with copper marigolds! And there is much, much more than just marigolds here! I am sure Seeker Cassandra will be do excited to find a bouquet or two that tells her something sweet!’  
  
She is still on the word 'Seeker’ when the Inquisitor’s fingers twitch as if they had been stepped on, and a wisp of green and blue light whirls up from his palm, spinning a radiant, pulsing screen of a barrier that blocks the two of them out of both view and earshot of all the others in the laboratory.  
  
'Why would you bring up Seeker Cassandra?’ he asks in a lowered voice.  
  
Merrill beams, yet again, and begins to count off the reasons on her small, scarred fingers.  
  
'I looked through the book on my way over, and found notes on the margins in her handwriting. The same handwriting as all over the pages of the Tale of the Champion - the copy that she brought for me and ma'vhenan to sign the other day! Which must mean that she loves this book! And also… your face always lights up so brightly when you see her, brighter than when you see anyone else, except for Felix - so it would be nice to make her face light up in return… Wouldn’t it?’  
  
The Inquisitor raises his hand to his throat, but the splash of colour is still visible even through his fingers.  
  
'It is… that obvious then…’ he mumbles helplessly.  
  
'Maybe not to everyone,’ Merrill points out. 'I am just good at spotting happy faces. Cole has to know too - but we are the odd ones, and the not-so-odd ones are probably not paying attention. Not that it’s anything that you should be ashamed of. Being in love is the most wonderful thing in the world!’  
  
'Not when you are a useless old man who already lost everything once,’ the Inquisitor says under his breath. 'Though… Even if she doesn’t… Making her happy would…’  
  
He cuts short his half-coherent murmurs, and clears his throat.  
  
'Might… Might I borrow that book of yours, Merrill? Out of idle curiosity?’  
  
'Oh, it’s not mine,’ she chuckles. 'I don’t own it; the library does… But I do know that the chapter on roses is absolutely precious!’


End file.
